Sands of Time Read online

  She stepped out of the shade and stared around, trying to orient herself. Suddenly she wanted to be back with Gill and Mahmoud and the other members of the tour. The Temple was teeming with visitors; she hadn’t strayed into some area that was closed. Only a moment or so ago, a tall, lithe Italian man clad from head to foot in Gucci had glanced back at her with a smile and lifted a hand with a soft ciao as he followed his compatriots out of sight.

  She hitched her thumb determinedly into the strap of the day-sack on her back and walked straight down the avenue ahead of her.

  It was so hot, it was hard to breathe, the air around her seemed almost solid. She stopped and stared around again. Although she had been walking for two or three minutes, she didn’t seem to have moved. By some strange optical illusion, the same vista of columns appeared to stretch endlessly ahead and behind and to the left and right, but now, suddenly, there was more shade. She glanced up. She had, without noticing it, walked into an area that was still roofed. Here, the sand of the floor had been brushed aside to reveal smooth paving stones and it was cooler at last.

  There was a movement in the distance. Emma’s heart leaped. ‘Hello?’ Her voice sounded muted, strange. It hardly seemed to penetrate the vast shadows around her, but at that moment a young woman appeared, running towards her through the columns. She was wearing a long, white dress with a veil looped around her shoulders and neck and over her hair.

  Emma smiled and raised a hand in greeting, then the smile froze on her lips. The woman stopped, glancing over her shoulder, every gesture and line of her body denoting fear. There was a man behind her. Pounding over the paving slabs in sandalled feet, he was dressed in the long, loose, everyday garb of so many Egyptians, the galabiya. In his hand he was brandishing a knife. He stopped. Even at that distance Emma could see he was gasping for breath, the hand which was not clasping the knife clamped to his side as if he was winded. The man and the woman stared at each other for an interminable moment as Emma watched. She could see the longing in his eyes and the regret as he raised his hand towards her, a hand that was smeared with blood. For a moment, the woman hesitated. She reached out to him in a gesture which spoke of poignant love and loss and then she turned and started to run again, towards Emma. She was so close now that Emma could see her face, her dark eyes, huge with terror, her long hair, torn free of the veil, streaming black behind her, streaks of blood on her dress, her breast, her hands. Her cheeks were wet with tears.

  Terrified, Emma stepped back out of the way. Between one second and the next, she was there, close enough to touch, to see the detail of her torn, embroidered neckline, the shredded silk of the veil wrapped around her neck, the bare, slender feet soundless on the paving, and then she had run past. Emma spun round to stare after her, but she had gone. Trembling, Emma turned to where she had seen the man bending double to catch his breath. There was no sign of him either.

  Hardly daring to breathe, Emma crept towards the spot and stared down. There must be traces of blood. Some sign of the man’s anguish. Some sound. There was nothing.

  She looked back to where she had been standing. The sun blazed down between the pillars onto the sand.

  ‘Oh God!’ Slowly she turned full circle, staring up. There was no sign of a roof now – only lofty columns towering above her. Beneath her, there were no paving slabs either. She was beginning to panic. She was imagining things. It was the heat. The exhaustion. The strangeness of it all.

  ‘Gill?’ Her frightened cry echoed for a moment through the silence. ‘Mahmoud? Is there anyone there? Anyone?’ She took a deep breath, then she paused, listening. A voice was answering. She strained to hear it.

  ‘Hello?’

  There it was again. Nearer, this time. A man’s voice. She spun round, trying hard to locate the sound. It was deadened; strange.

  And then she saw him. Tall, his shock of fair hair obscured by a wide-brimmed sun hat, his eyes a clear green, like a cat’s, he appeared suddenly from behind a pillar only a few yards in front of her. For a moment they stared at each other in astonished silence, then his face relaxed into a grin. ‘It’s Emma isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh, thank God!’ Confused and still unnerved, she almost threw herself at him. ‘Did you see what happened?’ To her embarrassment, she found she couldn’t hold back the tears of shock.

  His arms closed around her, holding her steady, then gently he pushed her away, his hands on her shoulders. ‘I didn’t see anything. What’s wrong?’ He could feel her trembling violently.

  ‘I saw this woman.’ She could barely get the words out between her sobs. ‘There was a man chasing her. I don’t know why, but I got the feeling he had tried to strangle her! She must have stabbed him. He was bleeding!’ She was staring round wildly.

  ‘And where are they now?’ He frowned. For a moment she thought he was going to turn away, then she realised that his quick glance was as nervous as her own. He took off his hat and pushed his hair out of his eyes with the back of his hand.

  ‘I don’t know. I could feel their emotion. It was as if their love and their fear were tangible! Then it had gone!’ She ground the heels of her hands into her eyes, suddenly conscious of the fact that nothing she said made any sense, and that she had thrown herself into the arms of a total stranger. A stranger who knew her name.

  As though reading her thoughts, he asked, ‘You don’t remember me? I’m Patrick.’ His voice was deep and mellow. ‘I was at the next table on the boat last night. I saw you stray away from the party just now and I thought what a good idea to get out of the sun. I’m writing up the cruise for a travel mag. I was photographing the columns.’ He had a camera bag slung over his shoulder, a Nikon around his neck. ‘Then I heard you calling.’

  She gave him a watery smile. ‘I’m sorry I threw myself at you. I was so frightened. It was so strange. And after they disappeared it was as though suddenly I was the only person in the world.’

  He glanced round. ‘We still might be.’ He frowned. ‘There is an eerie atmosphere in here, I agree. Come on.’ He held out his hand. ‘We’d better find someone and tell them what you saw. I’m sure it wasn’t as bad as it looked. Whoever they were, they seem to have gone now.’ There was something about Patrick which she found comforting.

  They walked several paces down the centre of one of the avenues between the columns, then Emma stopped. She shook her head. ‘The roof was still there, where I saw them. And the floor was paved. Somehow, I’ve moved away from where it was.’ She turned round slowly. On every side, all she could see were vistas of columns beneath the sky. She saw Patrick glance at her for one thoughtful second and she grimaced. ‘You think I dreamed it up. Heatstroke or something.’ She shook her head slowly. ‘Am I going mad? But it was so real, so clear.’ She bit her lip.

  He stared past her into the distance. ‘No, I really don’t think you’re going mad. Something does feel wrong.’ He took a few steps away from her and, very cautiously, reached out to touch the column that was nearest them.

  She watched, holding her breath as his fingers traced the lines on the carved stone. He withdrew his hand and stared at it thoughtfully, then he reached into his hip pocket for a well-thumbed guide-book. ‘This doesn’t look right at all. I think we should find Mahmoud. He’ll know what to do.’ He took a few paces forward and stopped, puzzled. ‘There should be people. Crowds. I don’t understand.’

  ‘And the sparrows are quiet,’ Emma put in nervously. Her voice shook. ‘Did you notice?’ Suddenly it seemed terribly important.

  He turned back and put his arm around her shoulders. Somehow the gesture, protective and comforting, made her feel even more scared. She huddled against him, conscious that her mouth was dry with fear. ‘This isn’t in your guide-book, is it?’ She stabbed at the open page with her finger. ‘Look at all those columns. The hypostyle hall. It looks like this, but it isn’t. This goes on forever! We’re lost!’

  ‘We can’t be lost, Emma, it’s not possible. The site is vast, but not that vast.’
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  ‘Then we’ve fallen through a trap door in time –’ She broke off abruptly. She had meant the remark to be facetious but as their eyes met she saw that, for a split second, they both wondered if it were true. ‘They were ghosts, weren’t they?’ she said at last.

  There was a moment of silence. ‘It’s possible, I suppose.’ His reply was cautious.

  ‘So you believe in ghosts?’

  ‘Not until now.’

  ‘She was real, Patrick. She ran by me, only a few feet away.’ But without a sound, without a movement of the air around her. She managed a shaky smile. ‘Perhaps we’d better pinch each other!’ She saw him grin. Saw him reach out towards her. Felt the tips of his fingers brush against hers. Then the world went black.

  For a long moment she held her breath, unable to think, then the air around them exploded into sound. She felt Patrick grab her wrist, realised they were running, heard the echo of music and the noise of disembodied voices. ‘What’s happening?’ She was bewildered. Terrified.

  ‘I don’t know. Come on. Let’s get out of here.’

  At least now there was noise. Light. He clapped his hands over his ears as the sound of trumpets and brass echoed around the Temple. Stopping, he pulled her into his arms in the shelter of a stone wall.

  ‘It’s all right, Emma! It’s all right! It’s the sound-and-light show. I don’t know how, or why, but somehow we’re in the middle of it! Look!’ Bright lights flared up all around them.

  ‘It’s night. How can it be night?’ Emma found she was still clutching his hand.

  ‘I don’t know; and I don’t for the minute care. At least we’re out of that place!’ He caught her hand and they ran together, dodging between obelisks and statues, through columns and past walls, seeing spotlights playing on the stone near them, then swinging away to light another area.

  There was no one on the gate; the car park was a sea of empty coaches. Panting, they stopped and stared around.

  ‘We’ll find a taxi.’ Patrick glanced over his shoulder as one of the spotlights swung up towards the sky.

  To Emma’s relief he seemed to know where to find one, how to negotiate the fare with the driver, even where the boat was moored. As they rattled back through the streets of Luxor, she found she was still clinging to his hand.

  ‘Patrick,’ she said quietly. ‘Whatever happened back there?’ She glanced at him in the glare of the street lights as the taxi ground to a halt behind a sleepy man on a donkey. Their driver leant from the window with a string of good-natured invective. And the donkey moved over.

  ‘I’ve absolutely no idea, but somehow we’ve lost about twelve hours!’ Patrick glanced at his watch and frowned. ‘What time is it, my friend?’ He leant forward and tapped the driver’s shoulder. ‘This says 10.40.’ He stared at it for a moment. It had stopped.

  Emma frowned at her own wrist. ‘10.34. No one will believe us.’

  ‘No.’ He sat back in his seat with a sigh.

  They sat in silence.

  ‘Will they have reported us missing?’

  He shrugged. ‘I suppose so. Luckily, I’m here on my own. My ex-wife would have killed me if I’d disappeared for hours with a beautiful woman!’

  She acknowledged the compliment with a smile. ‘I’m divorced too. I’m here with a girlfriend.’

  ‘I hope she won’t be too hard on you for disappearing.’

  ‘She probably hasn’t even missed me, if the truth were known.’ Emma shook her head wryly. ‘Mahmoud will have, though. He counts everyone all the time.’

  The taxi had reached the darker streets now, away from the town centre. ‘We have several options,’ Patrick said slowly. ‘We can plead insanity. We can say one of us was ill. I can say I was following a story and forgot the time or got lost. We could say you came with me and we were sidetracked …’

  In the end that was the story they chose. After all, it was in a way true. They stood side by side like naughty children as Mahmoud berated them for being late and causing him worry, then they went together to the empty dining room where, having relented a little, he ordered them a drink and some soup.

  It was there that Gill found them.

  ‘You sly old thing!’ She sat down on the chair next to Emma. ‘How did you hook the most handsome man on the boat?’ She smiled dazzlingly at Patrick.

  ‘I thought Mahmoud was,’ Emma replied softly.

  ‘He is. Okay. The second most handsome.’ Gill giggled. ‘We’re leaving soon to set off up river. See you on deck.’

  Patrick waited for the door to close behind her before he reached for Emma’s hand. ‘So, you’ve hooked me, have you?’

  Emma smiled. ‘You must admit my technique is original!’

  He nodded soberly. ‘Unique.’

  ‘We’re never going to know what happened, are we?’

  Laughing, he shook his head. ‘Probably not. But I’m going to have a good try at finding out! That’s the investigative journalist in me.’ He leant forward on his elbows, pushing aside his soup bowl. ‘Will you help?’

  She nodded. ‘Of course.’

  ‘You’re not still frightened?’

  ‘Aren’t you?’

  There was a moment’s silence. Then he admitted, ‘If I’m honest, yes.’

  ‘I wonder if we could find out who they were. The man and the woman I saw.’

  ‘One incident out of four thousand years?’ He pondered. ‘It won’t be easy. But there will be records. The place is steeped in history. When the boat returns at the end of the week, we can make a start at the museum.’

  Beneath their feet the engine rumbled suddenly into life. He stood up. ‘Shall we go up on deck?’

  They stood side by side leaning on the rail, staring at the reflections in the water and the stark line of the distant mountains against the stars. ‘This is going to be an interesting holiday,’ he said at last.

  ‘That’s one way of looking at it.’ She glanced at him sideways. ‘I haven’t thanked you for rescuing me. I think I would have lost my mind if you hadn’t turned up when you did. I’d fallen through a hole in time.’

  ‘And I fell with you.’ He looked down and their eyes met for a moment.

  Behind them the moon was rising, huge and serene.

  ‘I wonder what their story was. Were they lovers, driven to despair by some sort of betrayal? Did he try to kill her and she defended herself, or did she start it? Or were they priest and priestess of the Temple, locked in battle over rival gods?’ She shivered. ‘I need to know.’

  He put his arm around her shoulders and they stood together in silence, watching the silhouette of the palm trees slide by. Emma found herself very conscious of the solid warmth of the man at her side. The strange way they had met, the sudden intimacy of the experience, had brought them together with an intensity which made her feel she had known him forever.

  She glanced up and found that he was looking down at her again. He smiled and she knew with absolute certainty that they would go back to the Temple. She shivered. But she also knew that whatever happened there and whatever tragedy they uncovered, she would follow him wherever he went, and that by some strange pact, born from the mystery of this eerie Egyptian night, their future together had been sealed in a Temple as old as time.

  Random Snippets

  Amanda loved travelling alone. She always had. Where her friends craved companionship and mutual support even on the shortest journey she did all in her power to avoid the hustle and endless chatter which was the inevitable result of someone else going along. She ducked and lurked on railway platforms; she studied shop windows with elaborate care as people she knew walked by, all for the sake of that blissful moment when the doors closed, the train drew away and she felt her spirit fly. She was not a woman who took a mobile phone wherever she went!

  It was not that she was unsociable. Far from it. She loved people, enjoyed their company, adored her job as an advertising executive and threw parties and cooked meals at the drop of a hat. But travelling �
�� and, at the end of the day, living – was something she felt she had to experience so absolutely fully that it had to be done alone.

  Sex of course cannot be done alone. Well, it can, but Amanda was not a solitary player in that field. She had a lovely, attentive, understanding man who knew the rules of her particular life plan and was happy to abide by them. She knew he had another life. He worked in the City and it was unlikely he did not find solace there when she was away, and sometimes that knowledge saddened her. But she could expect nothing else, nothing more. If she wanted her private secret side, so would he.

  Thus it was that he had gone with her to the airport when she had set off on her trip to Canada, joined her in a coffee after she had checked in, chatted amiably about her journey and waved her off with, had she turned to see, only the slightest touch of wistfulness in his smile.

  Amanda settled into her seat in delight. She had a new paperback to read, a guide book to Canada and a new spiral-back notebook – the latter because, although she didn’t realise it, Amanda was a writer. When she was born, amongst the thousands of genes she inherited from her parents was the writing gene. She had never actually manifested a desire to be a travel writer or a novelist or a poet. She had never attended writers’ circles or author talks at Waterstones, nor had she ever kept a diary as such. But, and it has to be admitted this was done almost surreptitiously, some might say even secretly, she wrote all the time. She called these writings her snippets. Things she had done. Things she had seen. Things she had thought. And people she’d met. This was the real reason she liked to avoid people she knew on her travels. They distracted her from the people she didn’t know. And from the endless stories which swirled in her head as character after character passed in front of her for her delectation.